March 22, 2024 – Back in 1964, a young David Bruce, smitten by a tasting he had done in college of a bottle of 1954 Richebourg Burgundy, founded what would become one of the iconic names in Santa Cruz Mountains winemaking history.
He once told me that he had spent the immense sum of $7.50 on that bottle of wine purchased in a wine shop in San Francisco. Most wines were around a dollar at the time. He was so captivated by the aromas that it sparked a lifelong obsession with Pinot Noir.
On 40 acres of steep land with a view of the Monterey Bay off Bear Creek Road, the young dermatologist cleared the land by hand, planted Chardonnay and Pinot Noir, raised a family, built a small winery and started making wine.
When winemaker Tony Craig started at David Bruce Winery as a cellar hand in 1991, the winery was making everything from Zinfandel to Riesling to Carignane. It seemed there was not a grape that Dr. David didn’t want to put in a bottle. But very little of it was Pinot Noir.
“I said to Dr. David, ‘Why aren’t we concentrating on Pinot Noir? I like to focus. This is how you get results. This is how you achieve success,’” recalls Craig.
Two things subsequently transpired that helped shape the winery’s destiny. The estate vineyard began to die from Pierce’s disease, and when it was replanted, careful thought was given to the selection of rootstocks and clones to maximize complexity. While they waited for the vines to become established, they got some fruit from the David Bruce selection of Pinot Noir that had been planted at Chalone earlier. It proved a godsend. Talk about paying it forward.
Landing on the cover of Wine Spectator in 1995 as one of the top five Pinot Noir producers opened the floodgates of fame for David Bruce Winery.
“We were getting great reviews and scores all over in the press, but that particular one really propelled our popularity. It was a golden moment for us,” says Craig.
This year marks the 60th anniversary of this storied brand, and it was gratifying to receive an email invitation earlier in March, announcing that David Bruce Winery was holding an Open House to celebrate the winery’s 60th anniversary. Sadly, Dr. David did not live to see this milestone, as he passed away on April 28, 2021, just shy of his 90th birthday.
I hadn’t seen the parking lot this packed since the old days of wine club events at the facility. My husband and I were club members there for years while living in Boulder Creek, and literally moved to our present location in 2000, so we could hike to the winery from a set of trails that run through our property and what used to be vineyard manager Greg Stokes’ parcel.
Shortly after moving there, we discovered that many of our neighbors worked at the winery, in the tasting room, cellar, front office and in maintenance. In fact, our neighbor, Lucky Vero, built the concrete edifice that became the tasting room and barrel room, to accommodate the growth of the winery in the late 1990s. In those halcyon days, we met winemaker Tony Craig, along with Erick Glomski and Ken Foster. It was a wonderful era. The wines were excellent, the parties epic and the company, always entertaining.
We would often hike down to the Muccigrosso’s property (Michael had a small vineyard and was making wine at nearby Byington, and his wife, Lynn, taught at De Anza College), and then hike up the steep and treacherous hill to the David Bruce tasting room. It was a great reward to see our neighbors Marie Strom or Sabina Molla, pouring. We met the late Jerry Starr, who became an ardent ambassador for the Santa Cruz Mountains Winegrowers Association, and Mark Robbins, who later worked for Testarossa. Many times, Dr. David would pop in, and we’d swap stories while sipping estate Chardonnay as luxurious as a warm summer afternoon.
But, by 2002, swift and lasting change came to the winery, and suddenly, our neighbors were out of a job and the winemaking team scattered to various parts of California and parts east. Craig went to Savannah-Chanelle, Stokes moved to El Dorado where he established Ursa Cellars with his wife, Deborah Elissagaray, who had also worked at David Bruce, and Ken Foster went to Mahoney, where he is still til this day. Eric Glomski went to Arizona and founded Page Springs Cellars.
Change did everyone who departed good, but it was hard to leave such a beautiful chapter in their lives. But the force behind the change was bound to write another chapter.
The 60th Anniversary Open House, which was not attended by either of the winery’s managing principals, sisters Jan Bruce and Linda Hugger, was described in the invite as a preview of what might be forthcoming. A mix of newer and library wines were poured, with estate and other regional sources, including Monterey and Sonoma counties.
The welcome wine was the 2016 Estate Riesling, which was showing a bit of secondary development, along with a bit of candlewax. Vintages 2018 and 2021 were also offered for sale, but not poured.
Highlights were the 2022 Santa Barbara Chardonnay with its golden apple, honeycomb and lemon, and the 2019 Estate Santa Cruz Mountains Chardonnay, which exhibits a mix of white peach and lemon curd with a base of brioche. The 2005 Sonoma Coast Pinot Noir is still showing lovely structure, sandalwood and mellowed red fruited persistence, while the 2005 Russian River Pinot Noir has oodles of soft ripe secondary fruit, and gushes with drinkability.
The winery is now owned by Hillsdale College, a private, conservative, Christian liberal arts college in Michigan, founded in 1844 by members of the Free Will Baptists. According to sources, women were admitted to the college in 1844, making it the second-oldest coeducational educational institution in the United States. Hillsdale takes no taxpayer money, and promotes “a classical liberal arts curriculum, necessary for preserving the blessings of civil and religious liberty.” The college is in the news for a class action lawsuit by two students brought for failing to establish and enforce proper policies for preventing and responding to sexual assaults. The college says, “accusations made in the suit are serious mischaracterizations of Hillsdale College’s campus culture and sexual assault policies and procedures.”
The college has an endowment of $972 million, representing an increase of nearly $100 million from the prior year’s value. For scale, Stanford’s endowment in 2022 was $36B, while University of Santa Clara, with the second-largest endowment among our local universities, was about $1.47 billion in 2022.
Wonder who happens to be the Chairman of the Board of Hillsdale? Spin that wheel and take a guess. Turns out TV game show host Pat Sajak has been chairman of the Hillsdale College Board of Trustees since 2019, after former chairman, William Brodbeck, retired. Sajak had served as vice president of the board since 2003, and has been a longtime supporter of the college.
What might a college see in a winery in California? They do own several interesting event and retreat venues in the Midwest, including Rockwell Lake Lodge, a 16,000 square foot lodge set on a pristine lake with cabins and private docks in the middle of 673 woodland acres, and the Dow Hotel and Conference Center, right on the college campus in Hillsdale, MI.
It might not be such a big leap to consider owning a fairly well-known winery in California that also offers event space, along with wine to supply those other venues.
The David Bruce Tasting room at 21439 Bear Creek Road, is now open Thursday through Monday, 11am until 4pm. Reservations can be made by calling or emailing: (408) 399-5800; wineclub@davidbrucewinery.com
David Bruce Winery is also signed up to pour this Sunday at the SCMWA Grand Tasting at The Mountain Winery. It’s sure to be a very popular table.
About the author
Laura Ness is a longtime wine journalist, columnist and judge who contributes regularly to Edible Monterey Bay, Spirited, WineOh.Tv, Los Gatos Magazine and Wine Industry Network, and a variety of consumer publications. Her passion is telling stories about the intriguing characters who inhabit the fascinating world of wine and food.
